


let your love be

by RoseateGales



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, Mild Angst, Not Canon Compliant, blood mention, post-Crestwood, what if
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-07-08 15:01:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19871548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseateGales/pseuds/RoseateGales
Summary: It's like clockwork, the give and take of care. A white, warm comfort that blooms and they settle too easily into. But their gazes meet, and they know it cannot last, a cavern of silence and unsaid truths since Crestwood opening between them.-post-crestwood. after returning from a battle gone wrong, eludysia wakes to find solas seated by her bedside, having cared for her. inevitably, it results in their familiar tug-and-pull, and a confrontation.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: 1/10/2019: so. i wrote this fic and _oh, sweet memory_ several months ago, when i just finished the game and was super excited and i had to write because what else would i do with a grieving heart over this awesome and terrible ship y’know. however, the result of that and my subsequent obsession with this game series meant that i would further develop the lavellan in this fic, to the point that she is quite different from what you’re reading in these two first fics for her. the essence of her character is there, but she is different. i may rewrite these two fics to reflect that one day, but for now, please bear that in mind when reading.

It's all chaos. It's all a haze. The reins are slipping though she grips with what strength she has left.

There's a caustic pain, from where a Red Templar blade thrust between her ribs. The wound is festering and the bandages are dampening from blood and sweat. Shouts and murmurs echo in her ears, past the thundering of her pulse. Wind whistles, and she shivers. Briefly, she registers Cassandra and Cullen calling for mages and healers. People part, allowing her horse and retinue to trot through Skyhold's gates. And as they enter the courtyard, someone rushes to her side and lifts her off the saddle, onto a pallet. Her body groans and shrieks from the pain of moving. People gather around. So many. She thinks she sees Solas among them, and hears his voice calling for answers, furious. She wants to respond. 

But consciousness slips, and she fades into darkness.


	2. Let Your Love Be

The humming fire is not what wakes her; it is a simple song that keeps her breathing calm, and consciousness comfortably within reach and not. What pulls her awake, instead, is the flashes of days prior. She can see it all still: A sudden surge of Red Templar activity on the Coast, a call for reinforcements. Their full strength not yet recovered from the Arbor Wilds. The decision made to lead the charge herself. Unexpected numbers found leaping from forest shade. Lightning in the sky. Inquisition men and women braving bones cut by blades and soaked by heavy rain. She’d cast a barrier, but not quick enough. 

And she was struck. 

Red overcame everything she saw. Red lyrium, red blood seeping from her side. She opened her mouth to scream, but piercing pain convulsed and drowned out the sound. Her body simply lay, gasping. The last thing she knew before black overtook, were the orders of Commander Cullen to defend her, the Inquisitor, and the rest of their fallen brethren. 

Everything after, Eludysia could only recall as a tumult of frantic hands and worried whispers.

But that was then and there. Here, the air is warm and dry, and soft cotton sheets wrinkle beneath her palms. Her armor has been stripped and her clothes changed. No longer is she sticky in spilled blood and dirt, though a thin layer of sweat can be felt covering her skin. And she feels the bandages have been changed, too; the wound that lay beneath them no longer shrieking like bones splintering apart, but healed into a cool, dull ache. The result of magic, it would seem. 

With that in focus, a part of her longs for continued rest again. Yet sleep wavers further and further away, the waking world making itself known in the former’s place. Slowly, groaning, she lifts the present weight off her lids to get a look at her surroundings— to find Solas seated on a chair beside her bed, relief at once easing a crease between his brows.

"You're awake," he whispers, a smile hovering on his lips.

"Yes," she manages. Her throat tightens and grates at the movement, dry as a mouthful of sand. How long was she asleep? A day? Two? Long enough.

He reaches out to her, and she lets him. Pillows are propped and she is gingerly set against them, wary of her healing ribs and anything that would bring strain. He then walks over to the desk, where a goblet awaits its filling from a jug of water, and he returns to place it in her hands. She accepts and mouths a thank you, before gulping down the whole of its contents.

It's like clockwork, the give and take of care. A white, warm comfort that blooms and they settle too easily into. But their gazes meet, and they know it cannot last, a cavern of silence and unsaid truths since Crestwood opening between them. 

_"Tell me you don't care," she cried, bare, confused, angry. Looking to save herself. To place the blame solely on him._

_"I can't do that," he'd said, denying her even that, though he withdrew from her without so little as an answer for why._

_And so, in her disbelief, in a desperate attempt to salvage and hide what was left of the heart that he took, she pushed him further away. Emotionally. Physically. In spite of herself. "Tell me I was some casual dalliance, so I can call you a coldhearted son of a bitch and move on!"_

_"I'm sorry."_

She winces at the memory. It lashes and echoes as they watch each other, hesitant and locked. Ensnared by questions and rising, pulsing heartbeats. One waiting for the other to make the first move.

It’s taken by Solas.

"I should inform the council of your waking." With that, he steps to the door. He is three paces away when—

"No, wait," the words leap past Eludysia's lips before she can catch them. 

He stops, and looks back at her with his head tilted to the side and a brow raised.

"Wh..." She tries to begin, the sudden boldness dissipating as she knows there is no return from what is to come. A breath is drawn and she braces herself. "Why are you here, Solas?"

The planes of his features harden as if iron, his posture stiffening and hands folding behind his back, as if he was and is nothing more than a blade to her army. Another soldier for the Inquisition's cause. "When you arrived at Skyhold—"

"You know what I meant."

But of course he does. He blinks, and just like that, his shoulders lower and their lines soften, as does his gaze. And he becomes nothing but a man again. "I saw you laying there, bleeding and feverish... And I was worried, afraid of losing you."

_Does he know what he's doing? What he has done to her?_ She wonders at this, considers the weight of his confession. Her grip tightens around the goblet still her in hands, pressing against the metal, marking lines onto her skin. And heat pricks at her eyes, even as she tries to look at everything, anything but him, to hold her own. It does little good to stop the tears from creeping in, however. Leaving her to relent, with a quivering sigh, meeting his grey eyes with green. "If that's the truth... Why did we end what we had? _After…?_ "

"Because you deserve better than what I can give," he says as if simple and plain.

That takes her aback. The unveiling of her people’s errors, removing her vallaslin, the talk of duty... All of this pain, all he would not say... Because she was put on a pedestal of his own making? She shakes her head. "Shouldn't I get a say in that?" Sharp pleading breaks her voice. Tears brim and fall, and she permits them so. "What do you see me as?"

Something flickers behind his eyes. A spark that’s there and gone. Too fast for her to fully name. "Must you ask?”

“Yes!” She hisses, simmering fury spilling through gritted teeth. “Because I have no idea what your intentions are anymore! You tell me I deserve better, but you treat me as undeserving of knowing you. You say that you’re afraid of losing me, but you were the one who decided our end. And now here you are... You can’t have things both ways, Solas.” Throat thick and straining, face stained by tears, wound throbbing from building pressure— She groans and gasps for air and relief.

In an instant, an emerald glow appears at her side, cast under his hand, coaxing the pressure to alleviate. She sinks into the pillows as it does so, willing steady breaths. That he is suddenly so close, his back bent forwards and face just above hers, does not escape notice. If she simply held up her fingertips, she could trace the tensed jawline she so often kissed, brush away the deep frown on his lips.

She doesn’t.

It’s not right. None of this is right. 

There’s a pull to avert her eyes again. Perhaps second attempt would bode better. Or, better yet, closing them. Pushing his wrist away. Letting him go one last time. Even at the cost of a lie.

  
She would, but then—

“I am so sorry, vhenan. I never— I never meant for you to get hurt.”

His voice is just shy of a whisper, but it’s enough to capture her widened eyes, and to turn them tender and still. Apologetic, for her part in the mess they’d made.

"I'm sorry,” comes her careful reply, tone leveled with his. “For walking away. But, ma’lath... I am no more than the woman you see. I’m _real_. I’m _here_."

“I know.” He sighs. Her breathing relaxed, his hand moves to join its counterpart in cradling her face, tilting her head slightly back so he can look upon her in clear view. His thumb wipes away the tears on her cheek, and for a moment, for a heartbeat, the words, the excuses he might mean to say are without form and are wrest from him. “That is… frightening.”

She places a hand over his, holding it firmly in place. “Why?”

He chuckles. “How should I begin?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> vhenan = heart. (of course.)  
> ma'lath = my love.
> 
> i wrestled with this one. i'm... a sucker for the "my love almost DIED and losing them became so much more REAL" trope, so i had to explore it with solas and my lavellan. but of course, it's not solavellan if it doesn't make you want to fight something. 
> 
> hope you enjoyed this little fic either way. x


End file.
